Friendship Bracelets
by Laurabeast
Summary: Carol's joke about making friendship bracelets leads to her actually making them, and admitting they could be more than friends. Daryl is more self conscious than he lets on.


**I started out writing a tiny fic, and it got away from me a bit.**

Carol wanted to be there for the group, and understand their fear, but honestly there was only one person she couldn't stand to lose in this group, or any other. Her best friend. She chuckled to herself, that definitely didn't encompass their relationship, but it was the most intimate way she'd heard Daryl refer to anyone.

She twisted the thick fisherman's twins around an old broad blade arrow head. She'd found a few destined to be scrapped, chipped, and dull, they would throw off the balance of even the best archer. Instead she had saved them for a pair of matching bracelets. Once she'd secured the arrow head, she made two tiny flowers on either side out of sea shells. She soaked two thick leather bands in rose water before she pulled the complicated knotwork tight at the center. She'd woven the twine through the small holes in the leather before she'd even started, and as the leather tightened up it secured the centerpiece nicely.

She took the buckles, and the leather off an old pair of boots that someone had walked through the soul of, so it shone, supple and black with the fresh oil she worked into it. She put hers on, a weak smile tugging at the corner of her lips. It wasn't the adorable puka shell bracelet she had teased him with, but it meant so much more.

"What are you so happy about?" Daryl slid down beside her to take his watch. She leaned into him so their shoulders touched.

"Matching bracelets for me and my best friend." She held his up, he scoffed, but when he saw the intricate details, and delicate work she had put into them he took the leather band.

"It kinda looks like the one Merle used to wear." He whispered, she took his wrist, and fastened the bracelet for him.

"It was meant to, I didn't think you'd wear it if I made a string of shell flowers." She turned his arm over to examine her work, her hand moving into his.

" I would a. " He twined his fingers with hers, the shells on their matching bracelets clacking together quietly. She gave him that amused, but quisitive look where she poured her lips.

"If you made it, I'd wear it. Wore that damn poncho didn't I?" He glanced over at her, while keeping his head turned.

"It was supposed to keep you warm!" She nudged his shoulder, he chuckled, lifting his arm up to put around her shoulders without letting go of her hand.

"It did." Silence settled over them, and Carol curled into him as close as she could, his warmth chasing away the cold.

"I'm not just your best friend, you know that right?" Carol finally whispered , the night air carrying her words just enough to be heard.

"What do you mean?" He tensed, waiting for her to list off the other people who meant more to her, or say her was like a brother to her.

" I love you Daryl. I'm in love with you, and I have been since the farm. You don't need to say anything, I just wanted to make sure you knew. I hope that's okay. " She stayed where she was, unable to face his gaze. He didn't pull away either, which left them in their first uncomfortable silence since their fight in the farm.

"I... I love you too, course I do. Since the road, watching you feel free and safe at the end of the world just because that dumb ass was gone. You always treated me decent. I just... I don't know how to be in love. Never felt this with anyone. Not ever." He spoke painfully slow, she looked at their clasped hands, bringing them to her lips.

"It doesn't have to be anything different if you don't want that. I just want to be able to lay down next to you when we sleep. Anything new can be at your pace, or not at all. All that matters is that you know now." She finally shifted away far enough to look up at him, he looked nervous, like he'd cornered a wild animal.

"Is that why you left Tobin, and the King?" He leaned his head against hers, their breath mingling between them.

"I left Tobin because I never loved him, he was a sweet distraction, and that was all. He got too attached, and I didn't think I could bare the weight of someone else counting on me. It was different with Ezekiel, I really thought I loved him while you were gone. I suppose I did in a way, the same way you love any fairy tale, but in the end of was just like with Ed..." Daryl stiffened, turning a hard gaze at her, she lifted her free hand to cup his cheek with a chuckle.

"No! Not like that! You know if he'd have hit me I would have put him in the ground. I meant that with Ed I could only be half of myself. I had to be that mousey, demure housewife that did as she was told. With King Ezekiel I had to be the hard fool to his whimsy, someone to ground him, but sometimes I'm still the soft, hopeful woman I was years ago, or the woman who wants to be alone on the road. He never saw that in me, he never loved the wounded, and wild side of me. You're the only person who sees me as I truly am, and when you came back I realized I couldn't keep lying to him. So yes, I left the King for you." She whispered the last bit, and he closed the distance between them. The kiss started chaste, hardly a brush of his lips against hers, but when he retreated she followed; her eyes closed, and lips parted. She didn't dare cross wholly into his territory however, she had just promised to let him set the pace.

Seeing her, only a hair breadth away, just begging silently for his touch drove him well past the point of reason. He met her advance, falling into a clumsy, desperate kiss. Her touch was patient, and eager, showing him the steps. Soon they settled into a ravenous kiss that demanded more. He put a hand on her hip, not sure what he was meant to do. She climbed into his lap, taking his hand, and pulling it up under the hem of her shirt.

He cupped her breasts through the crude binding she wore, brushing his calloused thumb over her peaks. She moaned into his mouth, and he pulled away, dropping her on the ground gracelessly.

"Shit! I'm sorry! I didn't, you, it... It was too much. Shit! I didn't mean to toss you." He helped pull her to her feet, brushing the dirt off her clothes. She laughed, leaning her head on his shoulder, while her slender frame shook against him. He tentatively looped his arms around her in a loose embrace.

"It's okay. Maybe we should have a sign for when it gets to be too much for you so I don't end up in a heap again." She pulled back, the biggest smile he had ever see on her resting easy on her kiss stung lips.

" I wasn't exactly thinking straight with you squirming in my lap woman. " He looked down at where their bodies touched now, still hard as a damn rock, and thankfully no longer on the verge of a panic attack.

"Well next time you can just tap out. I promise I won't do anything you don't want." She kissed his cheek, lingering in his space.

" it ain't about not wanting it, I want you so bad it hurts, " he pressed his hips into hers to demonstrate, making her gasp at the size of him. "I just can't breathe when I think about it all. I'm shit at all this." He let his head drop to her shoulder , she stroked the fine hairs at the nape of his neck gently.

"Is that why you never said anything?" She whispered , he nodded against her. "Do you think you're going to disappoint me, or are you afraid of being intimate with anyone?" She squeezed him closer.

"Both." He mumbled, she kissed his neck.

"You don't have to worry about disappointing me, I'm already more reved up than I've ever been with anyone else." She chuckled, and he shook his head, his hands moving slowly up her hips under her shirt.

"As for the rest we can take as much time as you want." She let her eyes slip shut to enjoy his touch.

" I want to make it good for you. " He kissed her neck, sucking gently before soothing it with his tongue. She melted into him with a loan of his name.

"Let me touch you, just that. Keep them damn hands to yourself or you might kill me with them little moans you make." He whispered , his voice a low rumble of lust. She held her hands over her head. He pushed her up against a tree, one hand holding both of hers in place while the other made short work of the button on her jeans.

"Been watching them hips swing for years, tempting me." He plunged his hand into her soft cotton panties already wet with anticipation.

"Daryl!" She gasped, too loud. They were out in the open after all. He silenced her with a kiss, sinking his fingers into her wet heat.

"Hush now, we ain't inside them walls where it don't matter of you're screaming for me." He growled, nipping at the shell of her ear before moving down to kiss her neck. His thumb found it's mark, circling it slowly before working her up in earnest. Watching the way she fell apart in his arms was the sweetest torture. She nearly collapsed, saved only by the steel of his hands holding her in place.

"Ain't ever seen anything so fucking beautiful." He freed his arm, and used it to pull her into him so they could sit back down. Sitting across his lap, rather than straddling him seemed so deliciously intimate.

"You're still... Up." She mumbled , her post orgasm thoughts were a bit muddled, she could easily nap right where she sat.

"Ain't about that." He said, she forced herself to open her eyes, he smiled, a soft expression only she ever got to see.

"I want you to feel good too, but if you don't want to it can wait. If your worried you'll finish too quickly I promise you won't. I'm already more than satisfied." She said , he shook his head, kissing her slowly.

"It's the other way around darling, once I get into it, I get all wound up in my head, and I can't finish." He said , she nodded laying her head back on his shoulder.

"Well how about once we get inside any four walls I would very much like to feel you inside me, even if it doesn't end in climax for you, if that's okay." She said against the leather of his vest, he growled, shifting his lap.

"You're a damn vixen." He leaned his head against hers, trying to focus on watch since he sure as hell hadn't been doing much of that before.

"Love you too pooky." She hummed, letting herself drift off in the arms of the man she loved. They were private people, and they already spent most of their days together so keeping their new found intimacy a secret was easy. They didn't even mean to do it, it just came about as an unspoken thing between them.

Alone time was hard to come by, as always, and they spent it languidly exploring each other's bodies. Daryl always seemed to catch himself in a moment, and get in his own head before he could find release. Even in his own hands he couldn't finish while she watched, though they both enjoyed trying.

"Hey." She pulled him into the bathroom of the house they were sleeping in at the moment, kissing him when heroin as her against the closed door.

"Hey darling." His hair tickled her cheek as he moved to kiss her neck. Not getting release made him delightfully insatiable.

"Mm, wait. Down pooky." She teased, he groaned, and pulled back as requested. She shimmied out of her pants, and hopped up into the sink.

"I want to try something." She hooked her feet around d his hips, pulling him into her.

"That right? What you got in mind?" He dipped down on one knee, burying his head between her thighs. Her head fell back in a silent gasp. She'd gotten better at keeping it down, but that man had a way of breaking her.

" Fuck, Daryl! " her thighs squeezed almost painfully as his now practiced moves brought her to climax in minutes.

"That what you want darling?" His southern draw pulled thicker when he got intimate. He wiped the sheen of her spendings from his beard on the crook of his arm as he got to his feet.

"No, well sort of. I want you inside, I want you to keep me hovering at the precipice the way you do until the very end. We're all stuck here until this storm passes, and I want to see how long I can stand such delicious torture." She takes her nails over his side while she spoke, making him shiver.

"So you don't want me to finish, even if by some damn miracle I get there?" He moved between her legs until the rough fabric of his jeans pressed against her warmth.

"No, no cumming for you." She way goes her finger at him. He nipped at it, sucking her finger into his mouth briefly before unzipping himself. She fell into him as he slid inside of her. He started to move, but she wrapped her legs around him, pulling him closer.

"Go slow. No chasing an ending, just be here with me, and let me love you." She whispered , he stopped, pulling back to kiss her.

"I love you Carol." He seated the words into her skin with his mouth, one hand coming up from her hips to cup her breaat. Every move was slow, a languid dance of passion. His hands and hips bring her so close over and over, all the while he whispered to her about his love, and she did the same. A quiet cacophony of mumbled words that should have been spoken ages ago that made him weak in the knees.

she couldn't help it, every word, and every touch brought her closer to the edge, and no amount of pulling back could save her from the precipice of ecstasy. Her nails dug into his skin, and her teeth clamped down on his neck to keep herself from crying out as she shattered around him in an orgasm like no other.

"Carol!" He roared out her name without control as he spilled into her, shaking, and weak. She tried to hold him to her, but his knees have out, and they slid awkwardly to the floor. He held her to his chest, keeping her off the cold tile floor.

"Well that's new." She whispered , curling up against him.

"Jesus fuck, I ain't never felt anything that damn good." He clutched her shirt, still shaking in the after shock.

"Agreed, you sure know how to rock a girl's world. Though I think you might have alerted everyone in the house to what we were doing. You thought I was loud." She sat up to tease him, he cocked a brow at the door.

"Guess it was bound to happen eventually, folks are nosey as hell." He dismissed, she chuckled, getting to her feet to put her pants back on.

"Come on you, let's go get the ribbing over with." She held a hand out to him, he used it to pull her back down to the floor.

"Fuck them, they can wait until my damn legs work again." He mumbled, which only made her laugh harder.

"Guys, you've been in their for over an hour. Other people would like to use the mirror, and we've got a kid here that can also hear you two!" Aaron called through the door while he knocked. Daryl groaned, letting her go, and finally getting to his feet.

"Yeah, yeah, keep your damn pants on we're coming." He pulled the door open, his hair still ruffled, and his pants haphazardly zipped.

"So this is why you left?" Ezekiel stood behind Aaron with Michone, and Judith. Machine smacked him in the chest with a glare.

"Not entirely, but honestly I've loved Daryl longer than I've known you, so it did play a part." She shrugged, Judith shifted past them to stand in front of the couple.

" I'm glad you finally told her, you two deserve to be happy! " Judith slammed into him for a hug, Carol chuckled joining their hug.

"Thanks kid." He put his arms around both of them.

"Alright, we're all happy you two are finally together, but the storm let up, so we need to get moving." Michone said pointing to the window where the sun shone through them. Carol failed to stop her laughter, leaning into Daryl, who hooked his arm around her waist. Things were messed up out in the world like alway, but they would get through it together, like always.

**Depending on reviews I may write a follow up where Carol is pregnant, and very stressed about it.**


End file.
